A deal to put Spider-Man back in the Marvel universe — where, let's face it, he's always belonged — has been struck between Sony Pictures Entertainment and Marvel/Disney, the studios announced late Monday.

An all-new Spider-Man (not starring Andrew Garfield) will appear in an as-of-yet undisclosed Disney/Marvel film, while a standalone Spidey movie will stay at Sony, though Marvel Studios will have a hand in the reboot of the reboot (also without Garfield).

Amy Pascal, who oversaw the franchise for 13 years before stepping down last week as co-chair of Sony, will co-produce the standalone Spider-Man film with Marvel Studios chief Kevin Feige. That film already has a date: July 28, 2017.

Look at that release date again: It's just over a year from now, and yes, it is sending major ripples through plans that Marvel announced back in October: No less than four films that Marvel Studios already had in the pipeline are being pushed back to make room for Spidey.

The Amazing Spider-Man.

Image: Sony Pictures Entertainment

Thor: Ragnarok, originally scheduled for July 28, 2017, moves back three months to November 3, 2017. Black Panther, originally set for for November 3, 2017, moves back eight months to July 6, 2018. Captain Marvel, originally set for July 6, 2018, moves back four months to November 2, 2018. And Inhumans, set for November 2, 2018, moves back eight months to July 12, 2019.

Avengers: Infinity War - Part 1, set for May 4, 2018; and Avengers: Infinity War Part 2 on May 3, 2019, respectively, remain unchanged. Except for the fact that Spider-Man will probably be in them.

Monday night's announcement is nothing less than a seismic shift in the superhero movie landscape, where a complex web of intellectual-property rights — divvied up before Marvel movies became a billion-dollar business — has kept globally-known characters intractably separated.

Though Spidey, the Avengers and the X-Men all spring from the same shared Marvel comic-book universe, where the next crossover series is never more than a summer away, Sony has had Spider-Man since before Tobey Maguire first played Peter Parker in 2002; 20th Century Fox has been making X-Men films since 2000 and Marvel Studios first cranked out Iron Man at Paramount before that studio sold its distribution rights to Disney for $4 billion and change in 2009.

Rumors of a cinematic reunion between Spider-Man and the Avengers have persisted in the past months, aided by none other than Marvel godfather Stan Lee, who hinted as recently as early December that something was brewing.

Days later, as the Sony cyberattack was unfolding, it was suggested that Spidey might appear in Captain America: Civil War — which would only make sense, since Peter Parker is a major figure in the comic book upon which it will be loosely based.

There were other signs along the way, but even Marvel's truest believers had a hard time buying that Hollywood studios could find enough common ground to bring their beloved characters to the same screen. With Disney/Marvel flying higher than any brand in moviemaking, and Sony Pictures Entertainment picking itself up off the mat from a bruising year, the partnership only makes sense.

Next up: Casting Spider-Man anew, a game that already began Monday night on Twitter. Many were calling for the Miles Morales (who is black) version over Peter Parker; though such a thing seems unlikely at such a major pivot point for the character, Marvel's publishing arm has been leading the way in a major diversity push for its slate of characters, including the announcement last week of an all-female Avengers team.

And soon we'll find out which Marvel standalone film will first include Spider-Man ... but come on, we all know it's Civil War, right? The third Captain America installment, which follows this summer's Avengers: Age of Ultron, finds our heroes divided into two factions: those who want to comply with a U.S. government mandate to register all super-beings, and those who don't.

In it, Parker is a major ally of Tony Stark, who is firmly in the compliance camp.

Long-time Marvel comics fans are unanimous, though: Having Spidey back with his fellow Avengers can only be a good thing.

Now about those X-Men ...

What do you think of Spider-Man's return to the Marvel Cinematic Universe? Let us know in the comments.

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